Download as PDF
Federal Register / Vol. 72, No. 248 / Friday, December 28, 2007 / Notices
Dated: December 21, 2007.
Tracey L. Thompson,
Acting Director, Office of Sustainable
Fisheries, National Marine Fisheries Service.
[FR Doc. E7–25177 Filed 12–27–07; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510–22–S
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration
Publication of North American Datum
of 1983 State Plane Coordinates in feet
in Nebraska
National Geodetic Survey
(NGS), National Ocean Service (NOS),
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration.
ACTION: Notice.
AGENCY:
The National Geodetic Survey
(NGS) will publish North American
Datum of 1983 (NAD 83) State Plane
Coordinate (SPC) grid values in both
meters and U.S. Survey Feet (1 ft =
1200/3937 m) in Nebraska, for all well
defined geodetic survey control
monuments maintained by NGS in the
National Spatial Reference System
(NSRS) and computed from various
geodetic positioning utilities. The
adoption of this standard is
implemented in accordance with NGS
policy and a request from the Nebraska
State Surveyor, Nebraska Department of
Roads, the Professional Surveyors
Association of Nebraska.
DATES: Individuals or organizations
wishing to submit comments on the
Publication of North American Datum of
1983 State Plane Coordinates in feet in
Nebraska, should do by January 28,
2008.
ADDRESSES: Written comments should
be sent to the attention of David Doyle,
Chief Geodetic Surveyor, Office of the
National Geodetic Survey, National
Ocean Service (N/NGS2), 1315 EastWest Highway, Silver Spring, Maryland,
20910, fax 301–713–4324, or via e-mail
Dave.Doyle@noaa.gov.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Requests for additional information
should be directed to David Doyle, Chief
Geodetic Surveyor, National Geodetic
Survey (N/NGS2), 1315 East-West
Highway, Silver Spring, MD, 20910;
Phone: (301) 713–3178.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
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SUMMARY:
Abstract
In 1991, NGS adopted a policy that
defines the conditions under which
NAD 83 State Plane Coordinates (SPCs)
would be published in feet in addition
to meters. As outlined in that policy,
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each state or territory must adopt NAD
83 legislation (typically referenced as
Codes, Laws or Statutes), which
specifically defines a conversion to
either U.S. Survey or International Feet
as defined by the U.S. Bureau of
Standards in Federal Register Notice
59–5442. To date, 48 states have
adopted the NAD 83 legislation
however, for various reasons, only 33
included a specific definition of the
relationship between meters and feet.
This lack of uniformity has led to
confusion and misuse of SPCs as
provided in various NGS products,
services and tools, and created errors in
mapping, charting and surveying
programs in numerous states due to
inconsistent coordinate conversions.
Revised Research Plan Summary is
available on the CCSP Web site at:
http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/
stratplan2008/summary/default.htm
Comments should be sent to Dr. Fabien
Laurier, Climate Change Science
Program Office at:
research-plan-summary@usgcrp.gov
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Dr.
Patricia Jellison, Climate Change
Science Program Office, 1717
Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite 250,
Washington, DC 20006, Telephone:
(202) 223–6262
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Dated: December 20, 2007.
David B. Zilkoski,
Director, Office of National Geodetic Survey,
National Ocean Service, National Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration
[FR Doc. 07–6233 Filed 12–27–07; 8:45 am]
I. Introduction
BILLING CODE 3510–JE–M
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration
RIN 0648–XE67
U.S. Climate Change Science Program
Revised Research Plan Summary
National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),
Department of Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of Publication of U.S.
Climate Change Science Program (CCSP)
Revised Research Plan Summary and
request for public comments.
AGENCY:
SUMMARY: Pursuant to Section 104(f) the
Global Change Research Act of 1990
(GCRA), the U.S. Climate Change
Science Program Revised Research Plan
Summary is being published in the
Federal Register for a 60-day public
comment period. The public comments
received on the Revised Research Plan
Summary will be considered during the
preparation of the final Revised
Research Plan as well as the Scientific
Assessment document required by
Section 106 of the GCRA. The final
version of the full Revised Research
Plan will be published on the CCSP web
site. Public comments received on the
Revised Research Plan Summary will be
made available upon request.
DATES: Comments must be received by
February 26, 2008.
ADDRESSES: A formatted version of The
U.S. Climate Change Science Program
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Summary of Revised Research Plan for
the US Climate Change Science
Program (CCSP)
About the Revised Research Plan
This Revised Research Plan is an
update to the 2003 Strategic Plan of the
US Climate Change Science Program
(CCSP) (http://www.climatescience.gov/
Library/stratplan2003/final/
default.htm), a document which was
developed via a thorough, open and
transparent multi-year process involving
a wide range of scientists and managers.
A significant part of this process was the
review of both the draft and final plan
by the National Academy of Sciences
(http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?recordlid=11565 for the
draft plan; http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?recordlid=10635 for the
final plan). These reviews played an
important role in influencing the 2003
Strategic Plan’s development.
The Strategic Plan has long-term
value to CCSP, but like any strategic
plan, it must be supplemented by
shorter-term revisions that take into
account both advances in the science
and changes in societal needs, and
CCSP has an ongoing long-range
strategic planning process to ensure that
these needs are met. The Revised
Research Plan (hereinafter referred to as
the Research Plan) draws on CCSP’s
long-range planning process and
provides this update, in compliance
with the terms of the Global Change
Research Act (GCRA) of 1990.
In the Research Plan, the reader will
find several things: (1) an updated
statement of vision, goals and
capabilities consistent with CCSP’s
current Strategic Plan but reflecting both
scientific progress and the evolution of
the Program based on accomplishments
and evolving societal and
environmental needs; (2) a description
of the relationship of the Research Plan
to the current Scientific Assessment; (3)
highlights of ways in which the program
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is evolving in the context of the progress
made over the years 2003–2007 since
the Strategic Plan was put in place, and
a description of the priorities that have
emerged as a result; and 4) a description
of research plans for the coming years,
in order to build upon the work
envisioned in the Strategic Plan and
begun over the past four years.
The purpose of this Summary of the
Research Plan is to provide information
about the structure, scope and content
of the Research Plan, in order to solicit
and facilitate public comment about the
Plan.
About the Climate Change Science
Program
The vision of CCSP is: A nation and
the global community empowered with
the science-based knowledge to manage
the risks and opportunities of change in
the climate and related environmental
systems. The core precept that motivates
the CCSP is that the best possible
scientific knowledge should be the
foundation for the information required
to manage climate variability and
change and related aspects of global
change. Thus the mission of the CCSP
is to:Facilitate the creation and
application of knowledge of the Earth’s
global environment through research,
observations, decision support, and
communication.
CCSP’s five strategic goals are:
• CCSP Goal (1): Improve knowledge
of the Earth’s past and present climate
and environment, including its natural
variability, and improve understanding
of the causes of observed variability and
change
• CCSP Goal (2): Improve
quantification of the forces bringing
about changes in the Earth’s climate and
related systems
• CCSP Goal (3): Reduce uncertainty
in projections of how the Earth’s climate
and related systems may change in the
future
• CCSP Goal (4): Understand the
sensitivity and adaptability of different
natural and managed ecosystems and
human systems to climate and related
global changes
• CCSP Goal (5): Explore the uses and
identify the limits of evolving
knowledge to manage risks and
opportunities related to climate
variability and change
In order to understand CCSP’s role in
fostering and coordinating US federallyfunded climate change research, it is
important to understand what CCSP is
and the role CCSP has in the federal
government. CCSP is not a federal
agency. Rather, it is a structure and a
mechanism for coordinating and
integrating federal research on global
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change, and making recommendations
on priorities that federal agencies
consider in their planning, as
authorized in the Global Change
Research Act of 1990 (GCRA). Research
on global change, including climate
change, is sponsored by thirteen federal
agencies; the CCSP agencies also
include government entities that do not
sponsor research but which play a
critical role in the federal process. The
latter are the Office of Science and
Technology Policy, the Council on
Environmental Quality, and the Office
of Management and Budget. CCSP
fosters coordination of federal global
change activities across thematic and
crosscutting elements that utilize four
core approaches: research, observation,
communication and decision support; it
also helps to coordinate international
research and cooperation. Member
agencies include the following:
Agency for International Development
Department of Agriculture
Department of Commerce
Department of Defense
Department of Energy
Department of Health and Human
Services
Department of the Interior
Department of State
Department of Transportation
Environmental Protection Agency
National Aeronautics and Space
Administration
National Science Foundation
Smithsonian Institution
The program is led by an interagency
committee of senior representatives
from the participating departments and
agencies that is responsible for overall
priority setting, program direction,
management review, and accountability
to deliver program goals. This
committee is chaired by the CCSP
Director. Interagency Working Groups
for each of the program’s research and
crosscutting elements plan and
implement interagency activities and
priorities aligned with CCSP’s Goals.
These elements include the following:
Atmospheric Composition, Climate
Variability and Change / Modeling,
Water Cycle, Land-Use and Land-Cover
Change, Carbon Cycle, Human
Contributions and Responses / Decision
Support, Observation / Data
Management, Communication, and
International Research and Cooperation.
CCSP has a single office, the function of
which is to facilitate the activities of the
Program by providing value-added
staffing and day-to-day coordination of
CCSP-wide program integration,
strategic planning, product
development, and communication.
Global change research activities
across CCSP’s thirteen departments and
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agencies includes research conducted
by scientists in federal agencies,
academia, industry, and non-profit
organizations through a mix of directed
and competed programs. The Research
Plan provides a summary of ways in
which CCSP provides leverage for
individual agency efforts through
improved coordination and
communication, and provides an
avenue for integrating and producing
reports to Congress that include both
research progress and a summary of
future plans. CCSP also provides
climate-related input to other federal
and Administration initiatives (e.g., the
Ocean Action Plan, the US Group on
Earth Observations), and a way for the
federal climate change research
establishment to assess joint
opportunities and needs for
programmatic evolution in response to
changing societal and environmental
needs.
The Research Plan outlines CCSP’s
key products. One of these is CCSP’s
annual report to Congress, which
provides a yearly update on key
scientific findings and plans for the
coming fiscal year. CCSP also sponsors
workshops, like the 2005 workshop on
Decision Support, which brought
together experts and stakeholders on
climate change and its impacts and
yielded a report of its proceedings
(http://www.climatescience.gov/
workshop2005/finalreport/default.htm ).
CCSP also contributes expertise and
support to other national and
international assessments, including the
IPCC Fourth Assessment (2007). Other
key products of the Program include the
aforementioned 2003 CCSP Strategic
Plan and a series of twenty-one
Synthesis and Assessment Products (in
progress) that are one outcome of the
substantial stakeholder engagement in
the earlier strategic planning process.
These Synthesis and Assessment reports
provide in-depth ‘‘state of the science’’
information responsive to CCSP
overarching strategic goals and related
to specific national, regional and
sectoral issues. (Please see http://
www.climatescience.gov/Library/
default.htm for information on available
products and the status of products in
preparation.) In addition, numerous
peer-reviewed scientific papers are
published each year under the auspices
of CCSP.
The Research Plan provides an
overview of CCSP Program management
and review, including communications;
how the Program is structured and how
priorities are established and used;
existing and planned annual and multiyear internal review processes, NRC
reports and assessments; stakeholder
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and community engagement and
guidance; ties to other national,
international and sectoral assessments
such as IPCC, WMO-UNEP, Arctic
Climate Impact Assessment, and other
reports; and linkages to agency budget
processes.
II. Progress, Priorities and Plans
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Research Progress towards Goals 2003—
2007
Section II of the Research Plan
provides an overview of the Program’s
progress and priorities. Significant
progress has been made in many areas
of climate change research, as evidenced
by the development of the 21 Synthesis
and Assessment Products; several of
these reports are now complete and
others are in progress. The
accomplishments of the past four years
have led not just to advancement of
scientific knowledge, but as
significantly, to the evolution and
refinement of the science questions and
approaches needed for current and
future global change research. CCSP’s
strategic goals have a direct
relationship, by design, to the research
elements outlined in the GCRA. The
Research Plan provides a crosscut that
relates progress across GCRA research
elements to CCSP strategic goals and
core approaches, as well as selected
highlights of key progress (and the
impacts and societal benefits resulting
from that progress) across the research
elements called for in the GCRA:
(1) Global measurements, establishing
and providing stewardship for the
worldwide observations necessary to
understand the physical, chemical and
biological processes responsible for
changes in the Earth system on climaterelevant spatial and temporal scales
(2) Documentation of global change,
including the development of
mechanisms for recording changes that
will actually occur in the Earth system
over the coming decades
(3) Studies of earlier changes in the
Earth system, using evidence from the
geologic and fossil record
(4) Predictions, using quantitative
models of the Earth system to identify
and simulate global environmental
processes and trends, and the regional
implications of such processes and
trends
(5) Focused research initiatives to
understand the nature of and interaction
among physical, chemical, biological,
and social processes related to global
change.
Emerging Priorities
CCSP has an ongoing planning
process, to determine yearly objectives
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as well as longer-term strategic
approaches. The Research Plan is a
reflection of the current stage of these
planning activities. CCSP’s planning
process uses the vision articulated in
the Strategic Plan for 2003–2013 as a
starting point, and is further informed
by CCSP-commissioned reports from the
National Research Council (e.g. the 2007
NRC review of CCSP: http://
books.nap.edu/
catalog.php?recordlid=11934), as well
as CCSP-sponsored stakeholder and
scientific outreach, involvement in
international global change programs,
and a wide range of assessment
activities in which CCSP is involved.
This approach provides the basis for
ongoing assessment and alignment of
priorities based on emerging scientific
and societal needs.
Any scientific research program must
evolve over time based on what has
been learned during earlier periods, and
CCSP is no exception. This is
particularly true for an Earth science
related program, in which the past
several years have brought dramatic
increases in knowledge; significant
advances in the length and quality of
observational data sets (including more
comprehensive observations of climatic
phenomena than was previously
possible); improvements in the scope,
resolution, and quality of models; and
the initiation of several major
observational efforts that have only now
begun to yield results for integrated
scientific study, or will appear shortly
after the release of the revised Plan.
One of the most significant
advancements of recent years is that
ongoing monitoring of key Earth
systems over the past four years and
analysis of records extending back
through time have revealed a number of
important Earth system changes and
previously-unknown processes,
including (but not limited to), the
continuation of warm years; changes in
the cryosphere, e.g. Arctic sea ice
coverage, significant changes in ice
mass in Greenland and Antarctica, and
permafrost temperature; changes in
patterns and frequency of wildfire;
changes in species distributions; ocean
acidification and its consequences;
changes in storminess; hydrologic
changes; and the recognition of
unexpected behavior in seasonal
greenness in tropical and temperate
forests. Continued collection of
paleoenvironmental data has also
provided a basis for understanding the
importance of not just climate change,
but also climate variability and the
potential for abrupt changes, to Earth
systems. This legacy of past
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observations is key to understanding
potential future changes and impacts.
Long- and short-term monitoring
efforts have benefited from advances in
technology and analysis capabilities;
however, there are significant
challenges associated with these gains.
These issues were the subject of a CCSP
internal workshop on Observations in
2006. Drawing from the report of that
workshop, the Research Plan addresses
the major issues relative to observations,
including: (1) advances and issues in
capabilities and their implications; (2)
gains and losses in orbital and groundbased observations networks, including
NPOESS, Landsat-like systems and
other climate sensors; (3) long- vs. shortterm observations; (4) advances in (and
costs of) computational and data storage
and retrieval capacity; and 5) the
increased sensitivity, scope and
comprehensiveness of climate models
and the needs thereof.
In the four years since the 2003
Strategic Plan was published, the
climate community has also completed
work on several important assessments,
including the IPCC 4th Assessment
Report (to which CCSP made substantial
scientific contributions) and the
Synthesis and Assessment Products
being developed under the auspices of
CCSP, which have helped to integrate
many related scientific areas and to
provide a comprehensive report on the
state of the science. These assessments
have had a significant influence on the
broader climate policy community, and
have helped to shape external dialogues
and to frame the new questions that face
policymakers. These discussions within
the user community have already begun
to place increased demands on CCSP to
provide more regionally-resolved and
sector-specific information about
climate, its societal impacts and
vulnerabilities, and to provide the
rigorous scientific basis to support
increased societal planning for
adaptation to and mitigation of the
effects of climate change.
As a direct result of the past four
years of Program activity and progress,
as well as recognition of the important
changes to earth systems noted above,
there are significant new demands on
CCSP. The most substantial of these is
the need for information at a scale that
is pertinent to direct land- and resource
management issues, in order to support
decision-making. The development of
robust partnerships will be an essential
component of CCSP’s response to these
needs. These areas include not just
climate change itself but improved
understanding of associated issues of
climate change impacts, adaptation,
vulnerability, and sustainability, as well
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as the need for tools for the delivery of
information for decision support in a
manner that is both timely and useful,
and at scales that are relevant, to
stakeholders’ needs.
This section of the Research Plan
contains specific examples of issues and
events that influence CCSP’s research
directions. The list of examples includes
such major developments as:
• Dramatic increases in knowledge
• Significant advances in the length
and quality of observational data sets
• Improvements in scope, resolution,
and quality of models and modeling
efforts
• Initiation of major new climate
sensors and observational efforts that
are now beginning to yield results for
integrated scientific study, and potential
loss of others
• Completion of important
assessments, including the IPCC Fourth
Assessment, assessments by WMO/
UNEP, the Arctic Climate Impact
Assessment, and CCSP’s Synthesis and
Assessment Products
Research and Programmatic Plans
The sections outlined above are
intended to provide an overview of the
structure and purpose of CCSP, its
products, accomplishments and
challenges, and the progress which has
led to the emergence of new priorities
and changed emphases over the past
four years. The remainder of the
Research Plan’s content is devoted to
the articulation of Plans for the Program
both programmatically and as related to
CCSP’s strategic goals, for the period
2008—2010 and beyond.
A sampling of programmatic and
research plans is provided in this
Summary. However, it is anticipated
that the full scope of these plans will be
developed with inclusion of the public
input that results from the publication
of this Summary. Since the public input
to this Research Plan will be an
essential component in developing the
research directions of CCSP, this input
will also be considered in the
development of the current Scientific
Assessment as required by the GCRA.
The GCRA requires that the Scientific
Assessment integrates, evaluates, and
interprets the findings of the [United
States Global Change Research]
Program. The current Scientific
Assessment is under development; it
will integrate and draw from many
sources, including the 2003 Strategic
Plan, the Synthesis and Assessment
Products, and this Research Plan,
including the public comments received
during the Research Plan’s
development, and other published
sources. By promulgating this Summary,
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CCSP invites and encourages public
comment to help inform both the
development of the Research Plan and
the articulation of CCSP’s future
research priorities.
In addition to research plans aimed at
achieving objectives associated directly
with CCSP’s strategic goals, CCSP
intends to explore ways in which to
improve and extend its achievement of
programmatic goals. Issues related to the
crosscutting elements of modeling,
observations systems and networks,
stakeholder engagement and
communication of CCSP results to the
public, to non-governmental
organizations, to the climate change
technology community and to state and
local officials and other decisionmakers
are among the areas for needed growth
that were identified by the National
Research Council in its recent report on
CCSP progress (NRC 2007). Over the
next three years CCSP will actively
consider responses to these needs to
determine and implement effective
approaches. The CCSP agencies will
also continue to take a leadership role
in the dissemination of results and
products that come from the program’s
research, observations, and decision
support activities. In particular, the
program will ensure that the
conclusions from its assessment
products and activities are widely
communicated. In addition, the program
will coordinate the development of
interagency climate-related
communications with those of the
member agencies to help assure that the
accomplishments of the overall national
investment in climate-related science
are understood and are widely available
to users of the information.
The scope of CCSP scientific research
is far-reaching. CCSP Strategic Goals
encompass everything from basic
scientific research on Earth’s past and
present climate and climate variability,
the forces that result in changes to
Earth’s climate and related systems,
reducing uncertainties in projecting
future change and its consequences and
the sensitivity/adaptability of both
ecosystems and human systems, all the
way to the application of the knowledge
gained to the decisionmaking process
for the management of risks and
development of strategies for adaptation
to climate change. In the four years
since the release of the Strategic Plan,
investment in and progress towards
CCSP Goals 1 through 3 has been greater
than that for Goals 4 and 5. Significant
advances have been made in
documenting climate changes and
understanding the interconnected
workings of Earth systems.
Improvements in modeling capabilities
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have fostered a better understanding of
forcing factors and couplings between
ocean, atmosphere and land systems.
Relative to the state of the science four
years ago, substantial progress has been
made in understanding and predicting
climate change and variability at global
and continental scales. Accordingly,
strides have been made in
characterizing and reducing the
uncertainties associated with projecting
the magnitudes and effects of future
climate and related systems change. The
value of these results is demonstrated by
their inclusion in and importance to the
IPCC 4th Assessment.
As stated in Section I above, CCSP’s
Goals provide the focus and direction
for the program, to ensure that
knowledge developed by the
participating agencies and research
elements can be integrated and
synthesized, and this remains the
overarching strategy for the program.
The following descriptions provide a
sense of the strategic purpose and scope
encompassed by these goals, and the
way in which the goals inform research,
observations, decision support and
communications throughout the
program:
CCSP Goal (1): Improve knowledge of
the Earth’s past and present climate and
environment, including its natural
variability, and improve understanding
of the causes of observed variability and
change
Climate conditions change
significantly over the span of weeks,
seasons, years, decades, and even longer
time scales. CCSP research will improve
understanding of natural oscillations in
climate on time scales from weeks to
centuries, including improving and
harnessing ENSO forecasts, a large-scale
climate oscillation with implications for
resource and disaster management.
Research will continue to sharpen
qualitative and quantitative
understanding of climate extremes, and
to what degree any changes in their
frequency or intensity lie outside the
range of natural variability, through
improved observations, analysis, and
modeling. The program also will
continue to expand and refine
observations, monitoring, and data/
information system capabilities and
increase confidence in our
understanding of how and why climate
is changing. Fostering improved
interactions and connectivity between
research and ongoing operational
measurements and activities continues
to be another important aspect of the
program’s work.
CCSP Goal (2): Improve quantification
of the forces bringing about changes in
the Earth’s climate and related systems
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Combustion of fossil fuels, changes in
land cover and land use, and industrial
activities produce greenhouse gases
(GHGs) and aerosols and alter the
composition of the atmosphere and
physical and biological properties of the
Earth’s surface. These changes have
several important climatic effects, the
quantification of which has improved
dramatically in recent years but upon
which a substantial amount of work
remains to be done. Research conducted
through CCSP will continue to address
the reduction of uncertainty in the
sources and sinks of GHGs; aerosols and
their precursors; the long range
atmospheric transport of GHGs and
aerosols and their precursors; and the
interactions of GHGs and aerosols with
global climate, ozone in the upper and
lower layers of the atmosphere, and
regional-scale air quality. It will
continue to improve quantification of
the interactions among the carbon cycle,
other biological and ecological
processes, and land cover and land use
to better project atmospheric
concentrations of key greenhouse gases
and to support improved
decisionmaking. The program will also
continue to work towards improved
capabilities for developing and applying
emissions scenarios in research and
analysis, in cooperation with the
Climate Change Technology Program
(CCTP).
CCSP Goal (3): Reduce uncertainty in
projections of how the Earth’s climate
and related systems may change in the
future
While a great deal is now known
about the mechanisms that affect the
response of the climate system to
changes in natural and human
influences, many questions remain to be
addressed and refined. There is still
uncertainty regarding precisely how
much climate will change overall and
especially in specific regions. A primary
objective of CCSP is to continue to
develop information and scientific
capacity needed to sharpen both
qualitative and quantitative
understanding through interconnected
observations, data assimilation, and
modeling activities. CCSP-supported
research will continue to address basic
climate system properties and the
feedbacks or secondary changes that can
either reinforce or dampen the initial
and ongoing effects of greenhouse gas
and aerosol emissions and changes in
land use and land cover. The program
will also continue to address the
potential for future changes in extreme
events and uncertainty regarding
potential rapid or abrupt changes in
climate. CCSP will also continue to
build on existing U.S. strengths in
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climate research and modeling, and to
enhance capacity for development of
high-end coupled climate and Earth
system models.
CCSP Goal (4): Understand the
sensitivity and adaptability of different
natural and managed ecosystems and
human systems to climate and related
global changes
Seasonal to annual variability in
climate has been connected to impacts
on ecosystems and many aspects of
human life. Longer time scale natural
climate cycles and human-induced
changes in climate have additional
effects. Improving our ability to assess
the potential implications of variations
and future changes in climate and
environmental conditions on
ecosystems and human systems could
enable governments, businesses, and
communities to mitigate damages and
seize opportunities by adapting
infrastructure, activities, and plans.
CCSP research will increasingly
examine the interactions of multiple
interacting changes and effects (e.g., the
carbon dioxide ‘‘fertilization effect’’,
deposition of nitrogen and other
nutrients, changes in landscapes that
affect water resources and habitats,
changes in frequency of fires or pests) to
improve knowledge of sensitivity and
adaptability of systems to climate
variability and change. CCSP research
will also improve methods to integrate
our understanding of potential effects of
different atmospheric concentrations of
greenhouse gases and to develop
methods for aggregating and comparing
potential impacts across different
sectors and settings.
CCSP Goal (5): Explore the uses and
identify the limits of evolving
knowledge to manage risks and
opportunities related to climate
variability and change
In recent years, the scientific and
technical community has begun to
develop a variety of products to support
management of risks and opportunities
related to climate variability and
change, but much remains to be done in
this area. CCSP will foster additional
studies and encourage evaluation and
learning from these experiences in order
to develop and improve decision
support processes and products that use
knowledge to the best effect, while
communicating levels of uncertainty
appropriately. Working in partnership
with stakeholders and end-users of this
information, CCSP will develop
resources (e.g., observations, databases,
data and model products, scenarios,
visualization products, scientific
syntheses, assessments, tools and
approaches to engage ongoing
consultative mechanisms) to support
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policymaking, planning, risk reduction
and adaptive management.
As shown above, CCSP Goals 1
through 3 remains important, with
significant research questions that
remain to be articulated and answered.
One mechanism by which CCSP
undertakes these strategic priorities is
through the development of near-term
(i.e.1–3 year) interagency
implementation priorities. One example
of a near-term interagency
implementation priority that CCSP has
identified as needing intensive effort is
a focus on understanding carbon cycling
and climate change in high latitude
regions, since these regions are among
the most rapidly-changing areas of the
planet; another is the development of an
integrated Earth system analysis
capability to focus toward creation of a
high-quality record of the state of the
atmosphere and ocean since 1979,
information that is needed in order to
improve the assimilation of land cover
and dynamic sea ice modeling into
carbon and nutrient cycling and other
crucial areas.
The coming years will see
substantially increased need for CCSP to
accelerate progress on Goals 4 and 5, in
order to more fully understand the
implications of climate change for both
natural and managed ecosystems and to
improve the delivery of that information
to land and resource managers and other
stakeholders. This is an important area
of potential growth for CCSP. New foci
include improvements in the reliability
of ecological forecasting, in order to
foster and support natural resource
management and decision making; an
increased emphasis on the development
of an early warning system for the
possibility of abrupt climate change to
assist managers and decisionmakers in
planning for sea level rise and other
potential rapid changes; and an
increased focus on the development of
tools for decision support,; and an
increased focus on the development of
tools for decision support, to improve
delivery of needed information in
formats and at scales (particularly
regional scales) that maximize their
usefulness to stakeholders.
The increased emphasis on decision
support and the delivery of needed
information to stakeholders and
decision-makers discussed above is an
example of an evolving overall
programmatic priority for CCSP.
Further, each of the thirteen
participating agencies also has its own
priorities that make invaluable
contributions to CCSP, and which
contribute a large portion of CCSP’s
progress toward CCSP’s strategic goals.
In addition, CCSP has identified specific
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implementation priorities -- important
topics that require the coordinated
efforts of multiple agencies. While these
implementation priorities are only a
part of the overall program, they are
vital mechanisms through which CCSP
integrates agency activities to create
knowledge and products that are greater
than the sum of the individual agency
efforts. The following are examples of
implementation priorities for the next
few years that are inherently
interagency, and that will contribute to
the program’s long-term priorities
(priorities that are specific to single
agencies are not included here).
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Enhanced Carbon Cycle Research on
High Latitude Systems
The global carbon cycle has been one
of the seven interdisciplinary science
focus areas for CCSP and its GCRP
predecessors for many years.
Accomplishments include completion
of CCSP Synthesis and Assessment
Product 2.2 ‘‘State of the Carbon Cycle
Report’’(http://www.climatescience.gov/
Library/sap/sap2–2/final-report/
default.htm) as well as improved
availability of CO2 measurements and
advances in coupled carbon-climate
modeling and assimilation, plus others.
Recognition that high latitude systems
are increasingly important sources of
atmospheric carbon as regional warming
occurs makes it critical to improve our
understanding of the carbon dynamics
in high latitude systems, and the factors
that may lead to changes in those
dynamics. These are crucial elements of
global carbon modeling and a priority
for understanding the linkages and
feedbacks between carbon, ecosystems
and land cover, hydrology, and climate
variability and change.
Quantification of Climate Forcing and
Feedbacks by Aerosols, Non-CO2
Greenhouse Gases, Water Vapor, and
Clouds
The need to quantify and understand
the impacts of radiative forcing on
climate has long been important to
CCSP/GCRP. Advances have been made
in our understanding of climate
influences of aerosols, reactive gas
emissions and ozone in both the
troposphere and stratosphere, and these
continue to be important. The next level
of complexity adds the importance of
water vapor in the upper troposphere
and lower stratosphere, as a key
component of the atmospheric system.
There is now increased recognition of
the importance of quantifying the
climate forcing associated with aerosols,
clouds, the spatially-varying shorterlived trace gases, as well as upper
tropospheric and lower stratospheric
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ozone. Recent analysis, including that
associated with the Fourth Assessment
Report of the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change, has emphasized this
need, and a number of scientific
advances and improvement in
observation and modeling capability
make the timing appropriate for an
enhanced focus on this topic.
Development of an Integrated Earth
System Analysis Capability: A focus
toward creating a high-quality record of
the state of the atmosphere and ocean
since 1979
Just as the public and decision-makers
can today easily access weather maps
(i.e., ‘‘analyses’’ of the atmosphere) to
support a wide range of applications,
tomorrow’s decision-makers need tools
to visualize the evolving state of the
climate system over the entire planet,
including its oceans, land surface, and
vegetation. Substantial progress has
been made in the development of
coupled Earth system modeling,
particularly with the adoption of a
common Earth System Modeling
Framework. Historical reanalysis of data
for the 20th century, improvements in
coupled ocean-atmosphere analysis
capabilities and the incorporation of
land surface processes, sea ice dynamics
and the hydrological cycle will yield an
improved record of the state of the
atmosphere and ocean. This effort will
contribute to the ability to separate
natural and human-induced climate
forcing of climate variations and change,
and will result in improved accessibility
of research-based information on
climate variations and impacts to
decision-makers and the public.
Development of an End-to-End
Hydrologic Projection and Application
Capability
The need to provide information to
water resource managers and other
decision makers on issues related to
how climate affects water availability,
drought, and water quality has long
been a component of CCSP activities,
and the global water cycle is one of
CCSP’s identified research elements. An
end-to-end system to provide
information to water resource managers
and other decision makers on issues
related to how climate affects water
availability, drought, and water quality
requires integration and improvement of
existing research and monitoring
capabilities to reduce uncertainties in
hydrological/climate predictions.
Assembling the building blocks for the
development of an end-to-end global
water cycle infrastructure and an
development of an observations-based
Generalized Hydrological (water,
energy, biogeochemical) Modeling/
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Prediction Framework will help to
reduce uncertainties and improve
hydrologic predictions, leading to
improved decision-support information
and resources.
Assessing Abrupt Change in a Warming
Climate: Toward Development of an
Abrupt Change Early Warning System
Changes in the climate system are
considered ‘‘abrupt’’ if they occur more
rapidly than the time needed by society
and ecosystems to adapt to them (NRC
2002). Possible impacts range from
accelerated melting of ice sheets and
associated sea level rise, severe and
sustained droughts, to systematic
changes in weather patterns over broad
regions that may result from changes in
ocean circulation. CCSP has a research
element aimed specifically at climate
variability and change, which has
fostered considerable progress in our
understanding of past abrupt climate
events and the potential causes for rapid
changes. Given this progress, a nearterm emphasis is to reduce the
remaining knowledge gaps that limit our
ability to provide early warning
assessments of the likelihood of future
abrupt climate change, at global,
national and regional scales, over the
remainder of this century. The effort has
a special focus on those changes that
have the largest potential impacts, with
the overarching goal of providing
policy- and decision-makers with
information needed to better assess and
minimize future risks due to abrupt
change.
Ecological Forecasting
Ecological forecasting brings together
modeling with observations and results
from experiments and process studies to
predict the impacts of natural and
anthropogenic environmental changes
on life-sustaining ecosystems. Many
CCSP agencies are engaged in activities
that include components of an
ecological forecasting capability to
address critical emerging questions.
Progress has been made in such areas as
documenting changes occurring in
boreal forests. This has set the stage for
reducing scientific uncertainty about
possible future changes in primary
production, biogeochemistry, and
biodiversity, to findings that show that
global oceanic phytoplankton
productivity responds to changes in
upper-ocean temperature and
stratification. Work for the coming years
builds upon earlier investigations to
expand the development of models
linking geophysical and ecological
phenomena, to better characterize the
uncertainty associated with linked
models, and thus to provide more
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Federal Register / Vol. 72, No. 248 / Friday, December 28, 2007 / Notices
reliable ecological forecasts. The result
will be an enhanced understanding of
ecological response to changing climate
as well as improved natural resource
management and decision-making.
The full Revised Research Plan
includes—for both programmatic and
strategic goals—the identification of
emerging societal and scientific needs;
the changes and shifts in emphasis to
major scientific questions that have
resulted from advances in knowledge
and other accomplishments; the most
urgent research needs that have
emerged; and the expected outcomes,
products, impacts and societal benefits.
The brief examples above suggest the
direction that CCSP will evolve in the
future, towards increased engagement
with stakeholders and increased
attention towards relevance of scientific
results to decisionmaking and
policymaking. The full scope of the
Research Plan will reflect the public
input that results from the publication
of this Summary. By publishing this
Summary, CCSP invites and encourages
public comment to help inform both the
development of the Research Plan and
the articulation of CCSP’s future
research priorities.
III. End Matter
In keeping with CCSP policy and its
legacy of openness and transparency of
process, the Research Plan will close
with information regarding the
preparation of the Research Plan,
including but not limited to, a listing of:
(1) Authors; (2) Reviewers; (3)
References; (4) Sources of images and
other figures; and (5) Important Links
and Contact Information.
Dated: December 21, 2007.
William J. Brennan,
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for
International Affairs, and Acting Director,
Climate Change Science Program.
[FR Doc. E7–25254 Filed 12–27–07; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510–12–S
COMMODITY FUTURES TRADING
COMMISSION
CONTACT PERSON FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Sauntia S. Warfield, 202–418–5084.
David A. Stawick,
Secretary of the Commission.
[FR Doc. 07–6247 Filed 12–26–07; 11:15 am]
BILLING CODE 6351–01–P
COMMODITY FUTURES TRADING
COMMISSION
Sunshine Act Meetings
Commodity Futures Trading
Commission.
TIME AND DATE: 11 a.m., Friday, January
11, 2007.
PLACE: 1155 21st St., NW., Washington,
DC, 9th Floor Commission Conference
Room.
STATUS: Closed.
MATTERS TO BE CONSIDERED: Surveillance
Matters.
CONTACT PERSON FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Sauntia S. Warfield, 202–418–5084.
David A. Stawick,
Secretary of the Commission.
[FR Doc. 07–6248 Filed 12–26–07; 11:15 am]
BILLING CODE 6351–01–P
COMMODITY FUTURES TRADING
COMMISSION
Sunshine Act Meetings
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22:27 Dec 27, 2007
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Commodity Futures Trading
Commission.
TIME AND DATE: 11 a.m., Friday, January
4, 2007.
PLACE: 1155 21st St., NW., Washington,
DC, 9th Floor Commission Conference
Room.
STATUS: Closed.
MATTERS TO BE CONSIDERED: Surveillance
Matters.
CONTACT PERSON FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Sauntia S. Warfield, 202–418–5084.
COMMODITY FUTURES TRADING
COMMISSION
Sunshine Act Meetings
AGENCY HOLDING THE MEETING:
Commodity Futures Trading
Commission.
TIME AND DATE: 11 a.m., Friday January
18, 2008.
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COMMODITY FUTURES TRADING
COMMISSION
Sunshine Act Meetings
AGENCY HOLDING THE MEETING:
Commodity Futures Trading
Commission.
TIME AND DATE: 2 p.m., Wednesday
January 16, 2008.
PLACE: 1155 21st St., NW., Washington,
DC, 9th Floor Commission Conference
Room.
STATUS: Closed.
MATTERS TO BE CONSIDERED:
Surveillance Matters.
CONTACT PERSON FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Sauntia S. Warfield, 202–418–5084.
David A. Stawick,
Secretary of the Commission.
[FR Doc. 07–6251 Filed 12–26–07; 11:15 am]
BILLING CODE 6351–01–P
AGENCY HOLDING THE MEETING:
BILLING CODE 6351–01–P
VerDate Aug<31>2005
David A. Stawick,
Secretary of the Commission.
[FR Doc. 07–6250 Filed 12–26–07; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6351–01–P
AGENCY HOLDING THE MEETING:
Commodity Futures Trading
Commission.
TIME AND DATE: 11 a.m., Friday, January
25, 2008.
PLACE: 1155 21st St., NW., Washington,
DC, 9th Floor Commission Conference
Room.
STATUS: Closed.
MATTERS TO BE CONSIDERED: Surveillance
Matters.
1155 21st St., NW., Washington,
DC, 9th Floor Commission Conference
Room.
STATUS: Closed.
MATTERS TO BE CONSIDERED: Surveillance
Matters.
CONTACT PERSON FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Sauntia S. Warfield, 202–418–5084.
PLACE:
AGENCY HOLDING THE MEETING:
David A. Stawick,
Secretary of the Commission.
[FR Doc. 07–6249 Filed 12–26–07; 11:15 am]
Sunshine Act Meetings
73777
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Office of the Secretary
[Docket No. DoD–2007–OS–0145]
Proposed Collection; Comment
Request
Defense Finance and
Accounting Service, DoD.
ACTION: Notice.
AGENCY:
SUMMARY: In compliance with Section
3506(c)(2)(A) of the Paperwork
Reduction Act of 1995, the Defense
Finance and Accounting Service
announces a proposed public
information collection and seeks public
comment on the provisions thereof.
Comments are invited on: (a) Whether
the proposed collection of information
is necessary for the proper performance
of the functions of the agency, including
whether the information shall have
practical utility; (b) the accuracy of the
agency’s estimate of the burden of the
proposed information collection; (c)
ways to enhance the quality, utility and
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Agencies

[Federal Register Volume 72, Number 248 (Friday, December 28, 2007)]
[Notices]
[Pages 73771-73777]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E7-25254]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
RIN 0648-XE67
U.S. Climate Change Science Program Revised Research Plan Summary
AGENCY: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),
Department of Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of Publication of U.S. Climate Change Science Program
(CCSP) Revised Research Plan Summary and request for public comments.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY: Pursuant to Section 104(f) the Global Change Research Act of
1990 (GCRA), the U.S. Climate Change Science Program Revised Research
Plan Summary is being published in the Federal Register for a 60-day
public comment period. The public comments received on the Revised
Research Plan Summary will be considered during the preparation of the
final Revised Research Plan as well as the Scientific Assessment
document required by Section 106 of the GCRA. The final version of the
full Revised Research Plan will be published on the CCSP web site.
Public comments received on the Revised Research Plan Summary will be
made available upon request.
DATES: Comments must be received by February 26, 2008.
ADDRESSES: A formatted version of The U.S. Climate Change Science
Program Revised Research Plan Summary is available on the CCSP Web site
at:
http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/stratplan2008/summary/default.htm
Comments should be sent to Dr. Fabien Laurier, Climate Change Science
Program Office at:
research-plan-summary@usgcrp.gov
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Dr. Patricia Jellison, Climate Change
Science Program Office, 1717 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite 250,
Washington, DC 20006, Telephone: (202) 223-6262
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Summary of Revised Research Plan for the US Climate Change Science
Program (CCSP)
I. Introduction
About the Revised Research Plan
This Revised Research Plan is an update to the 2003 Strategic Plan
of the US Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) (http://
www.climatescience.gov/Library/stratplan2003/final/default.htm), a
document which was developed via a thorough, open and transparent
multi-year process involving a wide range of scientists and managers. A
significant part of this process was the review of both the draft and
final plan by the National Academy of Sciences (http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?record_id=11565 for the draft plan; http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?record_id=10635 for the final plan). These reviews played
an important role in influencing the 2003 Strategic Plan's development.
The Strategic Plan has long-term value to CCSP, but like any
strategic plan, it must be supplemented by shorter-term revisions that
take into account both advances in the science and changes in societal
needs, and CCSP has an ongoing long-range strategic planning process to
ensure that these needs are met. The Revised Research Plan (hereinafter
referred to as the Research Plan) draws on CCSP's long-range planning
process and provides this update, in compliance with the terms of the
Global Change Research Act (GCRA) of 1990.
In the Research Plan, the reader will find several things: (1) an
updated statement of vision, goals and capabilities consistent with
CCSP's current Strategic Plan but reflecting both scientific progress
and the evolution of the Program based on accomplishments and evolving
societal and environmental needs; (2) a description of the relationship
of the Research Plan to the current Scientific Assessment; (3)
highlights of ways in which the program
[[Page 73772]]
is evolving in the context of the progress made over the years 2003-
2007 since the Strategic Plan was put in place, and a description of
the priorities that have emerged as a result; and 4) a description of
research plans for the coming years, in order to build upon the work
envisioned in the Strategic Plan and begun over the past four years.
The purpose of this Summary of the Research Plan is to provide
information about the structure, scope and content of the Research
Plan, in order to solicit and facilitate public comment about the Plan.
About the Climate Change Science Program
The vision of CCSP is: A nation and the global community empowered
with the science-based knowledge to manage the risks and opportunities
of change in the climate and related environmental systems. The core
precept that motivates the CCSP is that the best possible scientific
knowledge should be the foundation for the information required to
manage climate variability and change and related aspects of global
change. Thus the mission of the CCSP is to:Facilitate the creation and
application of knowledge of the Earth's global environment through
research, observations, decision support, and communication.
CCSP's five strategic goals are:
CCSP Goal (1): Improve knowledge of the Earth's past and
present climate and environment, including its natural variability, and
improve understanding of the causes of observed variability and change
CCSP Goal (2): Improve quantification of the forces
bringing about changes in the Earth's climate and related systems
CCSP Goal (3): Reduce uncertainty in projections of how
the Earth's climate and related systems may change in the future
CCSP Goal (4): Understand the sensitivity and adaptability
of different natural and managed ecosystems and human systems to
climate and related global changes
CCSP Goal (5): Explore the uses and identify the limits of
evolving knowledge to manage risks and opportunities related to climate
variability and change
In order to understand CCSP's role in fostering and coordinating US
federally-funded climate change research, it is important to understand
what CCSP is and the role CCSP has in the federal government. CCSP is
not a federal agency. Rather, it is a structure and a mechanism for
coordinating and integrating federal research on global change, and
making recommendations on priorities that federal agencies consider in
their planning, as authorized in the Global Change Research Act of 1990
(GCRA). Research on global change, including climate change, is
sponsored by thirteen federal agencies; the CCSP agencies also include
government entities that do not sponsor research but which play a
critical role in the federal process. The latter are the Office of
Science and Technology Policy, the Council on Environmental Quality,
and the Office of Management and Budget. CCSP fosters coordination of
federal global change activities across thematic and crosscutting
elements that utilize four core approaches: research, observation,
communication and decision support; it also helps to coordinate
international research and cooperation. Member agencies include the
following:
Agency for International Development
Department of Agriculture
Department of Commerce
Department of Defense
Department of Energy
Department of Health and Human Services
Department of the Interior
Department of State
Department of Transportation
Environmental Protection Agency
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
National Science Foundation
Smithsonian Institution
The program is led by an interagency committee of senior
representatives from the participating departments and agencies that is
responsible for overall priority setting, program direction, management
review, and accountability to deliver program goals. This committee is
chaired by the CCSP Director. Interagency Working Groups for each of
the program's research and crosscutting elements plan and implement
interagency activities and priorities aligned with CCSP's Goals. These
elements include the following: Atmospheric Composition, Climate
Variability and Change / Modeling, Water Cycle, Land-Use and Land-Cover
Change, Carbon Cycle, Human Contributions and Responses / Decision
Support, Observation / Data Management, Communication, and
International Research and Cooperation. CCSP has a single office, the
function of which is to facilitate the activities of the Program by
providing value-added staffing and day-to-day coordination of CCSP-wide
program integration, strategic planning, product development, and
communication.
Global change research activities across CCSP's thirteen
departments and agencies includes research conducted by scientists in
federal agencies, academia, industry, and non-profit organizations
through a mix of directed and competed programs. The Research Plan
provides a summary of ways in which CCSP provides leverage for
individual agency efforts through improved coordination and
communication, and provides an avenue for integrating and producing
reports to Congress that include both research progress and a summary
of future plans. CCSP also provides climate-related input to other
federal and Administration initiatives (e.g., the Ocean Action Plan,
the US Group on Earth Observations), and a way for the federal climate
change research establishment to assess joint opportunities and needs
for programmatic evolution in response to changing societal and
environmental needs.
The Research Plan outlines CCSP's key products. One of these is
CCSP's annual report to Congress, which provides a yearly update on key
scientific findings and plans for the coming fiscal year. CCSP also
sponsors workshops, like the 2005 workshop on Decision Support, which
brought together experts and stakeholders on climate change and its
impacts and yielded a report of its proceedings (http://
www.climatescience.gov/workshop2005/finalreport/default.htm ). CCSP
also contributes expertise and support to other national and
international assessments, including the IPCC Fourth Assessment (2007).
Other key products of the Program include the aforementioned 2003 CCSP
Strategic Plan and a series of twenty-one Synthesis and Assessment
Products (in progress) that are one outcome of the substantial
stakeholder engagement in the earlier strategic planning process. These
Synthesis and Assessment reports provide in-depth ``state of the
science'' information responsive to CCSP overarching strategic goals
and related to specific national, regional and sectoral issues. (Please
see http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/default.htm for information
on available products and the status of products in preparation.) In
addition, numerous peer-reviewed scientific papers are published each
year under the auspices of CCSP.
The Research Plan provides an overview of CCSP Program management
and review, including communications; how the Program is structured and
how priorities are established and used; existing and planned annual
and multi-year internal review processes, NRC reports and assessments;
stakeholder
[[Page 73773]]
and community engagement and guidance; ties to other national,
international and sectoral assessments such as IPCC, WMO-UNEP, Arctic
Climate Impact Assessment, and other reports; and linkages to agency
budget processes.
II. Progress, Priorities and Plans
Research Progress towards Goals 2003--2007
Section II of the Research Plan provides an overview of the
Program's progress and priorities. Significant progress has been made
in many areas of climate change research, as evidenced by the
development of the 21 Synthesis and Assessment Products; several of
these reports are now complete and others are in progress. The
accomplishments of the past four years have led not just to advancement
of scientific knowledge, but as significantly, to the evolution and
refinement of the science questions and approaches needed for current
and future global change research. CCSP's strategic goals have a direct
relationship, by design, to the research elements outlined in the GCRA.
The Research Plan provides a crosscut that relates progress across GCRA
research elements to CCSP strategic goals and core approaches, as well
as selected highlights of key progress (and the impacts and societal
benefits resulting from that progress) across the research elements
called for in the GCRA:
(1) Global measurements, establishing and providing stewardship for
the worldwide observations necessary to understand the physical,
chemical and biological processes responsible for changes in the Earth
system on climate-relevant spatial and temporal scales
(2) Documentation of global change, including the development of
mechanisms for recording changes that will actually occur in the Earth
system over the coming decades
(3) Studies of earlier changes in the Earth system, using evidence
from the geologic and fossil record
(4) Predictions, using quantitative models of the Earth system to
identify and simulate global environmental processes and trends, and
the regional implications of such processes and trends
(5) Focused research initiatives to understand the nature of and
interaction among physical, chemical, biological, and social processes
related to global change.
Emerging Priorities
CCSP has an ongoing planning process, to determine yearly
objectives as well as longer-term strategic approaches. The Research
Plan is a reflection of the current stage of these planning activities.
CCSP's planning process uses the vision articulated in the Strategic
Plan for 2003-2013 as a starting point, and is further informed by
CCSP-commissioned reports from the National Research Council (e.g. the
2007 NRC review of CCSP: http://books.nap.edu/catalog.php?record--
id=11934), as well as CCSP-sponsored stakeholder and scientific
outreach, involvement in international global change programs, and a
wide range of assessment activities in which CCSP is involved. This
approach provides the basis for ongoing assessment and alignment of
priorities based on emerging scientific and societal needs.
Any scientific research program must evolve over time based on what
has been learned during earlier periods, and CCSP is no exception. This
is particularly true for an Earth science related program, in which the
past several years have brought dramatic increases in knowledge;
significant advances in the length and quality of observational data
sets (including more comprehensive observations of climatic phenomena
than was previously possible); improvements in the scope, resolution,
and quality of models; and the initiation of several major
observational efforts that have only now begun to yield results for
integrated scientific study, or will appear shortly after the release
of the revised Plan.
One of the most significant advancements of recent years is that
ongoing monitoring of key Earth systems over the past four years and
analysis of records extending back through time have revealed a number
of important Earth system changes and previously-unknown processes,
including (but not limited to), the continuation of warm years; changes
in the cryosphere, e.g. Arctic sea ice coverage, significant changes in
ice mass in Greenland and Antarctica, and permafrost temperature;
changes in patterns and frequency of wildfire; changes in species
distributions; ocean acidification and its consequences; changes in
storminess; hydrologic changes; and the recognition of unexpected
behavior in seasonal greenness in tropical and temperate forests.
Continued collection of paleoenvironmental data has also provided a
basis for understanding the importance of not just climate change, but
also climate variability and the potential for abrupt changes, to Earth
systems. This legacy of past observations is key to understanding
potential future changes and impacts.
Long- and short-term monitoring efforts have benefited from
advances in technology and analysis capabilities; however, there are
significant challenges associated with these gains. These issues were
the subject of a CCSP internal workshop on Observations in 2006.
Drawing from the report of that workshop, the Research Plan addresses
the major issues relative to observations, including: (1) advances and
issues in capabilities and their implications; (2) gains and losses in
orbital and ground-based observations networks, including NPOESS,
Landsat-like systems and other climate sensors; (3) long- vs. short-
term observations; (4) advances in (and costs of) computational and
data storage and retrieval capacity; and 5) the increased sensitivity,
scope and comprehensiveness of climate models and the needs thereof.
In the four years since the 2003 Strategic Plan was published, the
climate community has also completed work on several important
assessments, including the IPCC 4th Assessment Report (to which CCSP
made substantial scientific contributions) and the Synthesis and
Assessment Products being developed under the auspices of CCSP, which
have helped to integrate many related scientific areas and to provide a
comprehensive report on the state of the science. These assessments
have had a significant influence on the broader climate policy
community, and have helped to shape external dialogues and to frame the
new questions that face policymakers. These discussions within the user
community have already begun to place increased demands on CCSP to
provide more regionally-resolved and sector-specific information about
climate, its societal impacts and vulnerabilities, and to provide the
rigorous scientific basis to support increased societal planning for
adaptation to and mitigation of the effects of climate change.
As a direct result of the past four years of Program activity and
progress, as well as recognition of the important changes to earth
systems noted above, there are significant new demands on CCSP. The
most substantial of these is the need for information at a scale that
is pertinent to direct land- and resource management issues, in order
to support decision-making. The development of robust partnerships will
be an essential component of CCSP's response to these needs. These
areas include not just climate change itself but improved understanding
of associated issues of climate change impacts, adaptation,
vulnerability, and sustainability, as well
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as the need for tools for the delivery of information for decision
support in a manner that is both timely and useful, and at scales that
are relevant, to stakeholders' needs.
This section of the Research Plan contains specific examples of
issues and events that influence CCSP's research directions. The list
of examples includes such major developments as:
Dramatic increases in knowledge
Significant advances in the length and quality of
observational data sets
Improvements in scope, resolution, and quality of models
and modeling efforts
Initiation of major new climate sensors and observational
efforts that are now beginning to yield results for integrated
scientific study, and potential loss of others
Completion of important assessments, including the IPCC
Fourth Assessment, assessments by WMO/UNEP, the Arctic Climate Impact
Assessment, and CCSP's Synthesis and Assessment Products
Research and Programmatic Plans
The sections outlined above are intended to provide an overview of
the structure and purpose of CCSP, its products, accomplishments and
challenges, and the progress which has led to the emergence of new
priorities and changed emphases over the past four years. The remainder
of the Research Plan's content is devoted to the articulation of Plans
for the Program both programmatically and as related to CCSP's
strategic goals, for the period 2008--2010 and beyond.
A sampling of programmatic and research plans is provided in this
Summary. However, it is anticipated that the full scope of these plans
will be developed with inclusion of the public input that results from
the publication of this Summary. Since the public input to this
Research Plan will be an essential component in developing the research
directions of CCSP, this input will also be considered in the
development of the current Scientific Assessment as required by the
GCRA. The GCRA requires that the Scientific Assessment integrates,
evaluates, and interprets the findings of the [United States Global
Change Research] Program. The current Scientific Assessment is under
development; it will integrate and draw from many sources, including
the 2003 Strategic Plan, the Synthesis and Assessment Products, and
this Research Plan, including the public comments received during the
Research Plan's development, and other published sources. By
promulgating this Summary, CCSP invites and encourages public comment
to help inform both the development of the Research Plan and the
articulation of CCSP's future research priorities.
In addition to research plans aimed at achieving objectives
associated directly with CCSP's strategic goals, CCSP intends to
explore ways in which to improve and extend its achievement of
programmatic goals. Issues related to the crosscutting elements of
modeling, observations systems and networks, stakeholder engagement and
communication of CCSP results to the public, to non-governmental
organizations, to the climate change technology community and to state
and local officials and other decisionmakers are among the areas for
needed growth that were identified by the National Research Council in
its recent report on CCSP progress (NRC 2007). Over the next three
years CCSP will actively consider responses to these needs to determine
and implement effective approaches. The CCSP agencies will also
continue to take a leadership role in the dissemination of results and
products that come from the program's research, observations, and
decision support activities. In particular, the program will ensure
that the conclusions from its assessment products and activities are
widely communicated. In addition, the program will coordinate the
development of interagency climate-related communications with those of
the member agencies to help assure that the accomplishments of the
overall national investment in climate-related science are understood
and are widely available to users of the information.
The scope of CCSP scientific research is far-reaching. CCSP
Strategic Goals encompass everything from basic scientific research on
Earth's past and present climate and climate variability, the forces
that result in changes to Earth's climate and related systems, reducing
uncertainties in projecting future change and its consequences and the
sensitivity/adaptability of both ecosystems and human systems, all the
way to the application of the knowledge gained to the decisionmaking
process for the management of risks and development of strategies for
adaptation to climate change. In the four years since the release of
the Strategic Plan, investment in and progress towards CCSP Goals 1
through 3 has been greater than that for Goals 4 and 5. Significant
advances have been made in documenting climate changes and
understanding the interconnected workings of Earth systems.
Improvements in modeling capabilities have fostered a better
understanding of forcing factors and couplings between ocean,
atmosphere and land systems. Relative to the state of the science four
years ago, substantial progress has been made in understanding and
predicting climate change and variability at global and continental
scales. Accordingly, strides have been made in characterizing and
reducing the uncertainties associated with projecting the magnitudes
and effects of future climate and related systems change. The value of
these results is demonstrated by their inclusion in and importance to
the IPCC 4th Assessment.
As stated in Section I above, CCSP's Goals provide the focus and
direction for the program, to ensure that knowledge developed by the
participating agencies and research elements can be integrated and
synthesized, and this remains the overarching strategy for the program.
The following descriptions provide a sense of the strategic purpose and
scope encompassed by these goals, and the way in which the goals inform
research, observations, decision support and communications throughout
the program:
CCSP Goal (1): Improve knowledge of the Earth's past and present
climate and environment, including its natural variability, and improve
understanding of the causes of observed variability and change
Climate conditions change significantly over the span of weeks,
seasons, years, decades, and even longer time scales. CCSP research
will improve understanding of natural oscillations in climate on time
scales from weeks to centuries, including improving and harnessing ENSO
forecasts, a large-scale climate oscillation with implications for
resource and disaster management. Research will continue to sharpen
qualitative and quantitative understanding of climate extremes, and to
what degree any changes in their frequency or intensity lie outside the
range of natural variability, through improved observations, analysis,
and modeling. The program also will continue to expand and refine
observations, monitoring, and data/information system capabilities and
increase confidence in our understanding of how and why climate is
changing. Fostering improved interactions and connectivity between
research and ongoing operational measurements and activities continues
to be another important aspect of the program's work.
CCSP Goal (2): Improve quantification of the forces bringing about
changes in the Earth's climate and related systems
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Combustion of fossil fuels, changes in land cover and land use, and
industrial activities produce greenhouse gases (GHGs) and aerosols and
alter the composition of the atmosphere and physical and biological
properties of the Earth's surface. These changes have several important
climatic effects, the quantification of which has improved dramatically
in recent years but upon which a substantial amount of work remains to
be done. Research conducted through CCSP will continue to address the
reduction of uncertainty in the sources and sinks of GHGs; aerosols and
their precursors; the long range atmospheric transport of GHGs and
aerosols and their precursors; and the interactions of GHGs and
aerosols with global climate, ozone in the upper and lower layers of
the atmosphere, and regional-scale air quality. It will continue to
improve quantification of the interactions among the carbon cycle,
other biological and ecological processes, and land cover and land use
to better project atmospheric concentrations of key greenhouse gases
and to support improved decisionmaking. The program will also continue
to work towards improved capabilities for developing and applying
emissions scenarios in research and analysis, in cooperation with the
Climate Change Technology Program (CCTP).
CCSP Goal (3): Reduce uncertainty in projections of how the Earth's
climate and related systems may change in the future
While a great deal is now known about the mechanisms that affect
the response of the climate system to changes in natural and human
influences, many questions remain to be addressed and refined. There is
still uncertainty regarding precisely how much climate will change
overall and especially in specific regions. A primary objective of CCSP
is to continue to develop information and scientific capacity needed to
sharpen both qualitative and quantitative understanding through
interconnected observations, data assimilation, and modeling
activities. CCSP-supported research will continue to address basic
climate system properties and the feedbacks or secondary changes that
can either reinforce or dampen the initial and ongoing effects of
greenhouse gas and aerosol emissions and changes in land use and land
cover. The program will also continue to address the potential for
future changes in extreme events and uncertainty regarding potential
rapid or abrupt changes in climate. CCSP will also continue to build on
existing U.S. strengths in climate research and modeling, and to
enhance capacity for development of high-end coupled climate and Earth
system models.
CCSP Goal (4): Understand the sensitivity and adaptability of
different natural and managed ecosystems and human systems to climate
and related global changes
Seasonal to annual variability in climate has been connected to
impacts on ecosystems and many aspects of human life. Longer time scale
natural climate cycles and human-induced changes in climate have
additional effects. Improving our ability to assess the potential
implications of variations and future changes in climate and
environmental conditions on ecosystems and human systems could enable
governments, businesses, and communities to mitigate damages and seize
opportunities by adapting infrastructure, activities, and plans. CCSP
research will increasingly examine the interactions of multiple
interacting changes and effects (e.g., the carbon dioxide
``fertilization effect'', deposition of nitrogen and other nutrients,
changes in landscapes that affect water resources and habitats, changes
in frequency of fires or pests) to improve knowledge of sensitivity and
adaptability of systems to climate variability and change. CCSP
research will also improve methods to integrate our understanding of
potential effects of different atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse
gases and to develop methods for aggregating and comparing potential
impacts across different sectors and settings.
CCSP Goal (5): Explore the uses and identify the limits of evolving
knowledge to manage risks and opportunities related to climate
variability and change
In recent years, the scientific and technical community has begun
to develop a variety of products to support management of risks and
opportunities related to climate variability and change, but much
remains to be done in this area. CCSP will foster additional studies
and encourage evaluation and learning from these experiences in order
to develop and improve decision support processes and products that use
knowledge to the best effect, while communicating levels of uncertainty
appropriately. Working in partnership with stakeholders and end-users
of this information, CCSP will develop resources (e.g., observations,
databases, data and model products, scenarios, visualization products,
scientific syntheses, assessments, tools and approaches to engage
ongoing consultative mechanisms) to support policymaking, planning,
risk reduction and adaptive management.
As shown above, CCSP Goals 1 through 3 remains important, with
significant research questions that remain to be articulated and
answered. One mechanism by which CCSP undertakes these strategic
priorities is through the development of near-term (i.e.1-3 year)
interagency implementation priorities. One example of a near-term
interagency implementation priority that CCSP has identified as needing
intensive effort is a focus on understanding carbon cycling and climate
change in high latitude regions, since these regions are among the most
rapidly-changing areas of the planet; another is the development of an
integrated Earth system analysis capability to focus toward creation of
a high-quality record of the state of the atmosphere and ocean since
1979, information that is needed in order to improve the assimilation
of land cover and dynamic sea ice modeling into carbon and nutrient
cycling and other crucial areas.
The coming years will see substantially increased need for CCSP to
accelerate progress on Goals 4 and 5, in order to more fully understand
the implications of climate change for both natural and managed
ecosystems and to improve the delivery of that information to land and
resource managers and other stakeholders. This is an important area of
potential growth for CCSP. New foci include improvements in the
reliability of ecological forecasting, in order to foster and support
natural resource management and decision making; an increased emphasis
on the development of an early warning system for the possibility of
abrupt climate change to assist managers and decisionmakers in planning
for sea level rise and other potential rapid changes; and an increased
focus on the development of tools for decision support,; and an
increased focus on the development of tools for decision support, to
improve delivery of needed information in formats and at scales
(particularly regional scales) that maximize their usefulness to
stakeholders.
The increased emphasis on decision support and the delivery of
needed information to stakeholders and decision-makers discussed above
is an example of an evolving overall programmatic priority for CCSP.
Further, each of the thirteen participating agencies also has its own
priorities that make invaluable contributions to CCSP, and which
contribute a large portion of CCSP's progress toward CCSP's strategic
goals. In addition, CCSP has identified specific
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implementation priorities -- important topics that require the
coordinated efforts of multiple agencies. While these implementation
priorities are only a part of the overall program, they are vital
mechanisms through which CCSP integrates agency activities to create
knowledge and products that are greater than the sum of the individual
agency efforts. The following are examples of implementation priorities
for the next few years that are inherently interagency, and that will
contribute to the program's long-term priorities (priorities that are
specific to single agencies are not included here).
Enhanced Carbon Cycle Research on High Latitude Systems
The global carbon cycle has been one of the seven interdisciplinary
science focus areas for CCSP and its GCRP predecessors for many years.
Accomplishments include completion of CCSP Synthesis and Assessment
Product 2.2 ``State of the Carbon Cycle Report''(http://
www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap2-2/final-report/default.htm) as
well as improved availability of CO2 measurements and advances in
coupled carbon-climate modeling and assimilation, plus others.
Recognition that high latitude systems are increasingly important
sources of atmospheric carbon as regional warming occurs makes it
critical to improve our understanding of the carbon dynamics in high
latitude systems, and the factors that may lead to changes in those
dynamics. These are crucial elements of global carbon modeling and a
priority for understanding the linkages and feedbacks between carbon,
ecosystems and land cover, hydrology, and climate variability and
change.
Quantification of Climate Forcing and Feedbacks by Aerosols, Non-CO2
Greenhouse Gases, Water Vapor, and Clouds
The need to quantify and understand the impacts of radiative
forcing on climate has long been important to CCSP/GCRP. Advances have
been made in our understanding of climate influences of aerosols,
reactive gas emissions and ozone in both the troposphere and
stratosphere, and these continue to be important. The next level of
complexity adds the importance of water vapor in the upper troposphere
and lower stratosphere, as a key component of the atmospheric system.
There is now increased recognition of the importance of quantifying the
climate forcing associated with aerosols, clouds, the spatially-varying
shorter-lived trace gases, as well as upper tropospheric and lower
stratospheric ozone. Recent analysis, including that associated with
the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, has emphasized this need, and a number of scientific advances
and improvement in observation and modeling capability make the timing
appropriate for an enhanced focus on this topic. Development of an
Integrated Earth System Analysis Capability: A focus toward creating a
high-quality record of the state of the atmosphere and ocean since 1979
Just as the public and decision-makers can today easily access
weather maps (i.e., ``analyses'' of the atmosphere) to support a wide
range of applications, tomorrow's decision-makers need tools to
visualize the evolving state of the climate system over the entire
planet, including its oceans, land surface, and vegetation. Substantial
progress has been made in the development of coupled Earth system
modeling, particularly with the adoption of a common Earth System
Modeling Framework. Historical reanalysis of data for the 20th century,
improvements in coupled ocean-atmosphere analysis capabilities and the
incorporation of land surface processes, sea ice dynamics and the
hydrological cycle will yield an improved record of the state of the
atmosphere and ocean. This effort will contribute to the ability to
separate natural and human-induced climate forcing of climate
variations and change, and will result in improved accessibility of
research-based information on climate variations and impacts to
decision-makers and the public.
Development of an End-to-End Hydrologic Projection and Application
Capability
The need to provide information to water resource managers and
other decision makers on issues related to how climate affects water
availability, drought, and water quality has long been a component of
CCSP activities, and the global water cycle is one of CCSP's identified
research elements. An end-to-end system to provide information to water
resource managers and other decision makers on issues related to how
climate affects water availability, drought, and water quality requires
integration and improvement of existing research and monitoring
capabilities to reduce uncertainties in hydrological/climate
predictions. Assembling the building blocks for the development of an
end-to-end global water cycle infrastructure and an development of an
observations-based Generalized Hydrological (water, energy,
biogeochemical) Modeling/Prediction Framework will help to reduce
uncertainties and improve hydrologic predictions, leading to improved
decision-support information and resources.
Assessing Abrupt Change in a Warming Climate: Toward Development of an
Abrupt Change Early Warning System
Changes in the climate system are considered ``abrupt'' if they
occur more rapidly than the time needed by society and ecosystems to
adapt to them (NRC 2002). Possible impacts range from accelerated
melting of ice sheets and associated sea level rise, severe and
sustained droughts, to systematic changes in weather patterns over
broad regions that may result from changes in ocean circulation. CCSP
has a research element aimed specifically at climate variability and
change, which has fostered considerable progress in our understanding
of past abrupt climate events and the potential causes for rapid
changes. Given this progress, a near-term emphasis is to reduce the
remaining knowledge gaps that limit our ability to provide early
warning assessments of the likelihood of future abrupt climate change,
at global, national and regional scales, over the remainder of this
century. The effort has a special focus on those changes that have the
largest potential impacts, with the overarching goal of providing
policy- and decision-makers with information needed to better assess
and minimize future risks due to abrupt change.
Ecological Forecasting
Ecological forecasting brings together modeling with observations
and results from experiments and process studies to predict the impacts
of natural and anthropogenic environmental changes on life-sustaining
ecosystems. Many CCSP agencies are engaged in activities that include
components of an ecological forecasting capability to address critical
emerging questions. Progress has been made in such areas as documenting
changes occurring in boreal forests. This has set the stage for
reducing scientific uncertainty about possible future changes in
primary production, biogeochemistry, and biodiversity, to findings that
show that global oceanic phytoplankton productivity responds to changes
in upper-ocean temperature and stratification. Work for the coming
years builds upon earlier investigations to expand the development of
models linking geophysical and ecological phenomena, to better
characterize the uncertainty associated with linked models, and thus to
provide more
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reliable ecological forecasts. The result will be an enhanced
understanding of ecological response to changing climate as well as
improved natural resource management and decision-making.
The full Revised Research Plan includes--for both programmatic and
strategic goals--the identification of emerging societal and scientific
needs; the changes and shifts in emphasis to major scientific questions
that have resulted from advances in knowledge and other
accomplishments; the most urgent research needs that have emerged; and
the expected outcomes, products, impacts and societal benefits. The
brief examples above suggest the direction that CCSP will evolve in the
future, towards increased engagement with stakeholders and increased
attention towards relevance of scientific results to decisionmaking and
policymaking. The full scope of the Research Plan will reflect the
public input that results from the publication of this Summary. By
publishing this Summary, CCSP invites and encourages public comment to
help inform both the development of the Research Plan and the
articulation of CCSP's future research priorities.
III. End Matter
In keeping with CCSP policy and its legacy of openness and
transparency of process, the Research Plan will close with information
regarding the preparation of the Research Plan, including but not
limited to, a listing of: (1) Authors; (2) Reviewers; (3) References;
(4) Sources of images and other figures; and (5) Important Links and
Contact Information.
Dated: December 21, 2007.
William J. Brennan,
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for International Affairs, and
Acting Director, Climate Change Science Program.
[FR Doc. E7-25254 Filed 12-27-07; 8:45 am]
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